JCT Tips - Rail Passes

One of the best things a visitor to Japan can get is a rail pass - locals
view them with envy as they can provide unlimited travel on the rail network,
including shinkansen all over the country. However, many people find the
JR Pass and the regional passes confusing and are unsure if they should get them
or not. For the tours JCT operates, we usually get nationwide passes as
they provide an economic and simple way to get around the country, and we tend
to travel a bit further than just a return Tokyo/Osaka trip.

This page deals with travel between cities rather than the local train,
subway or metro passes that are available in different places around Japan.
Some of those can be quite useful, and stored value cards (SUICA and PASMO) can
be handy if you do not want to buy individual tickets all the time, but that is
not too time consuming if you know where you are going.

The Short Version:

The JR pass comes in three durations: 7 days, 14 days and 21 days.
Usage is counted in whole days, but if you start a journey on the last day of
your pass, you can complete the journey even if it runs past midnight. It
is most likely to be the correct pass to get if you are travelling between Tokyo
and Kyoto or Osaka (that is, between east and west Japan) because the regional
passes do not cover both of these cities under one pass.

Green Car Pass: Provides a higher level of comfort. On shinkansen the
seats are wider, more likely to have carpet, and the cars are better positioned
so when you stop at stations, the exits are closer.

The cheapest adult pass is Y29,110. If you are travelling Narita to
Tokyo and then to Kyoto or Osaka return, this is cheaper than individual tickets
(Y33,640 for Kyoto). However, if you arrive at Tokyo and depart Osaka,
then you do not get the return trip, so it is not as valuable.

Type:

Green

Ordinary

Duration

Adult

Child

Adult

Child

7-day

38,880 YEN

19,440 YEN

29,110 YEN

14,550 YEN

14-day

62,950 YEN

31,470 YEN

46,390 YEN

23,190 YEN

21-day

81,870 YEN

40,930 YEN

59,350 YEN

29,670 YEN

The Longer Version:

When considering if a JR Pass is worth it,
you need to have a look at where you are going and over what duration. Fares for different trips around the Japanese
rail network are available to pull up on Hyderdia.com, but this can take quite a
while to work out different combinations.

The longest shinkansen journey
is between Kagoshima-Chuo to Shin-Hakodate is basically
one end of the line to the other, 2,326 km for Y48,2200. That involves two
transfers and a little under 12 hours, but at an average speed of 200 km/hour
including stops is still pretty rapid.

The following
local train
examples are useful to fill in some of the gaps in the shinkansen network (adult, ordinary, reserved seat):

Kanazawa to Kyoto: Y7,100

Tokyo to
Nikko: Y5,780 (including shinkansen)

Kyoto to Takayama: Y8,770

Tokyo to Takayama: Y15,010
(including shinkansen)

Kyoto to Matsumoto: Y10,260

Tokyo to Matsumoto: Y7,100

Nagano to Matsumoto: Y1,140

Hakata to Nagasaki: Y4,700

Akita to Niigata: Y7,410

Nigatta to Kanazawa: Y10,430
(including shinkansen)

Aomori to Sapporo: Y13,570

Aomori to Akita: Y3,870

A couple of examples:

#1: Our July 2015 train tour took us from Tokyo to
Aomori, Akita, Niigata, Kanazawa, Kyoto, Nagoya and back to Tokyo over 14 days.
The rail pass cost of Y46,390 was less than the individual trips. Using
the above tables gives an approximate cost of Y49,730 (Tokyo to Shin-Aomori: Y17,550,
Aomori to Akita: Y3,870, Akita to Niigata: Y7,410, Kanazawa to Kyoto: Y7,100,
Kyoto to Tokyo: Y13,800, and we still need to add in Niigata to Kanazawa).

The savings were actually larger because we included a day trip to Nagoya
(Y11,580 return), a visit to Hirosaki from Aomori (Y1,340) and two of our guests
went to Tokyo for shopping from Niigata (Y21,540 return). We cancelled a
trip to Hiroshima due to weather (typhoon), but that would have been Y22,580,
and the Y6,440 for the short ride from Akita to Kakunodate was also covered, as
would have been a visit to Nikko on the last day of the pass validity (but
shopping in Tokyo was chosen instead).

#2: For our September 2017 month long tour which
covered a large part of the country we used two 14-day passes. While out
main travel occurred on only 14 out of 28 days the basic trip would have cost
Y144,500 but was covered by the Y93,000 cost of the rail pass. Again, we
added in some extra side trips (like Kakunodate from Akita and Iwakuni from
Hiroshima)